He had long meditated the organisation of this system, and embraced, as a favourable opportunity for its promulgation, the moment which saw him at length predominant in the North of Germany, and thus, in effect, master of the whole coasts of Europe from the mouth of the Oder round to the Adriatic Gulf. The system, however, could not be carried into effect, because from long habit the manufactured goods and colonial produce of Britain had come to be necessaries of life among every civilised people of the world; and consequently every private citizen found his own domestic comforts invaded by the decree, which avowedly aimed only at the revenues of the English crown. Every man, therefore, was under continual temptation, each in his own sphere and method, to violate the decrees of Berlin. The custom-house officers were exposed to bribes which their virtue could not resist. Even the most attached of Napoleon"s own functionaries connived at the universal spirit of evasion--his brothers themselves, in their respective dominions, could not help sympathising with their subjects, and winking at the methods of relief to which they were led by necessity, the mother of invention. The severe police, however, which was formed everywhere as a necessary part of the machinery for carrying these edicts into execution--the insolence of the innumerable spies and informers whom they set in motion--and the actual deprivation of usual comforts, in so far as it existed--all these circ.u.mstances conspired to render the name of the Berlin decrees odious throughout Europe and in France itself. It may be added that the original conception of Napoleon was grounded on a mistaken opinion, to which, however, he always clung--namely, that England derives all her strength from her foreign commerce. Great as that commerce was, and great as, in spite of him, it continued to be, it never was anything but a trifle when compared with the internal traffic and resources of Great Britain--a country not less distinguished above other nations for its agricultural industry, than for its commercial.
Napoleon received at Berlin a deputation of his Senate, sent from Paris to congratulate him on the successes of his campaign. To them he announced these celebrated decrees: he made them the bearers of the trophies of his recent victories, and, moreover, of a demand for the immediate levying of 80,000 men, being the _first_ conscription for the year 1808--that for the year 1807 having been already antic.i.p.ated. The subservient Senate recorded and granted whatever their master pleased to dictate; but the cost of human life which Napoleon"s ambition demanded had begun, ere this time, to be seriously thought of in France. He, meanwhile, prepared, without further delay, to extinguish the feeble spark of resistance which still lingered in a few garrisons of the Prussian Monarchy, beyond the Oder: and to meet, before they could reach the soil of Germany, those Russian legions which were now advancing, too late, to the a.s.sistance of Frederick William. That unfortunate Prince sent Lucchesini to Berlin, to open, if possible, a negotiation with the victorious occupant of his capital and palace; but Buonaparte demanded Dantzick, and two other fortified towns, as the price of even the briefest armistice; and the Italian envoy returned to inform the King, that no hope remained for him except in the arrival of the Russians.
Napoleon held in his hands the means of opening his campaign with those allies of Prussia, under circ.u.mstances involving his enemy in a new, and probably endless train of difficulties. The Part.i.tion of Poland--that great political crime, for which every power that had a part in it has since been severely, though none of them adequately punished--had left the population of what had once been a great and powerful kingdom, in a state of discontent and irritation, of which, had Napoleon been willing to make full use of it, the fruits might have been more dangerous for the Czar than any campaign against any foreign enemy. The French Emperor had but to announce distinctly that his purpose was the restoration of Poland as an independent state, and the whole ma.s.s, of an eminently gallant and warlike population would have risen instantly at his call.
But Buonaparte was withheld from resorting to this effectual means of annoyance by various considerations; of which the chief were these: first, he could not emanc.i.p.ate Poland without depriving Austria of a rich and important province, and consequently provoking her once more into the field: and secondly, he foresaw that the Russian Emperor, if threatened with the destruction of his Polish territory and authority, would urge the war in a very different manner from that which he was likely to adopt while acting only as the ally of Prussia. In a word, Napoleon was well aware of the extent of the Czar"s resources, and had no wish at this time to give a character of irremediable bitterness to their quarrel.
Though, however, he for these and other reasons refrained from openly appealing in his own person to the Poles as a nation, Buonaparte had no scruple about permitting others to tamper, in his behalf, with the justly indignant feelings of the people. Some of the heroic leaders of the Poles, in the struggles for their expiring independence, had long been exiles in France--not a few of them had taken service in her armies. These men were allowed, and encouraged, to address themselves to the body of their countrymen, in language which could hardly fail to draw eager and enthusiastic recruits to the French standard, and increase mightily the perplexities of the Russian counsels. Nor did Napoleon scruple to authorise the circulation of an appeal of like tendency, bearing _falsely_[56] the venerated signature of Kosciusko.
"Dear countrymen and friends," said the forgery, "arise! the Great Nation is before you--Napoleon expects, and Kosciusko calls on you. We are under the aegis of the Monarch who vanquishes difficulties as if by miracles, and the re-animation of Poland is too glorious an achievement not to have been reserved for him by the Eternal." Dombrowski and Wibichi, two Polish officers in Buonaparte"s own army, sent forward from Berlin, on the 8th of the same month, a proclamation, which commenced in these words:--"Poles! Napoleon, the Great, the Invincible, enters Poland with an army of 300,000 men. Without wishing to fathom the mystery of his views, let us strive to merit his magnanimity. _I will see_ (he has said to us) _whether you deserve to be a nation._ Poles! it depends then on yourselves to exert a national spirit, and possess a country. Your avenger, your restorer is here. Crowd from all quarters to his presence, as children in tears hasten to behold a succouring father. Present to him your hearts, your arms. Rise to a man, and prove that you do not grudge your blood to your country!" Lastly, in one of Napoleon"s own bulletins, the following ominous sentences were permitted to appear:--"Shall the Polish throne be re-established, and shall the Great Nation secure for it respect and independence? Shall she recall it to life from the grave? G.o.d only, who directs all human affairs, can resolve this great mystery!" These appeals produced various eager addresses from Poland--and Buonaparte prepared to visit that country, though not as her liberator.
Before re-opening the great campaign, Buonaparte received the submission and explanation of the Elector of Saxony, who truly stated that Prussia had forced him to take part in the war. The apology was accepted, and from this time the Elector adhered to the League of the Rhine, and was a faithful ally of Napoleon. The Landgrave of Hesse-Ca.s.sel had worse fortune. The answer to all his applications was, that he had ceased to reign. What use the Conqueror designed to make of the territories thus confiscated, we shall presently see. The Saxon army, and that of Hesse-Ca.s.sel, were both, however, at his disposal, and they both accordingly were marched forwards, and blended with the forces occupying Prussia.
The French, having invested Glogau, Breslau, and Graudentz, and left detachments to urge these sieges, moved towards the Polish frontier.
General Bennigsen, with a considerable Russian army, had advanced to overawe the dissatisfied population, and was now at Warsaw. But the march of the French van, under Murat, soon alarmed him in these quarters. After some skirmishes of little moment the Russians retired behind the Vistula, and Murat took possession of the Polish metropolis on the 28th of November. On the 25th Napoleon himself had reached Posen, and found himself surrounded by a population in a high state of excitement and enthusiasm. The ancient national dress reappeared: hope and exultation beamed in every countenance; the old n.o.bles, quitting the solitary castles in which they had been lamenting over the downfall of Poland, crowded the levees of the Victor, and addressed him in language which recalled the half-oriental character and manners of their nation.
"We adore you," said the Palatine of Gnesna, "and with confidence repose in you all our hopes, as upon him who raises empires and destroys them, and humbles the proud--the regenerator of our country, the legislator of the universe." "Already," said the President of the Council of Justice, "already our country is saved, for we adore in your person the most just and the most profound Solon. We commit our fate into your hands, and implore the protection of the most august Caesar."
Having largely recruited his armies with brave Poles, who fancied him both a Solon and Caesar, Napoleon now moved forwards. General Bennigsen found himself under the necessity of abandoning first the line of the Vistula, and then that of the Bug, and, the French still advancing in numbers not to be resisted by his division, at length threw himself behind the river Wkra, where Kaminskoy, the Russian commander-in-chief, and three other divisions of the army, had by this time taken their ground. On the 23rd of December Napoleon reached and crossed the Wkra, and Kaminskoy ordered his whole army to fall back upon the line of the Niemen. Bennigsen accordingly retired towards Pultusk, Galitzin upon Golymin, both followed by great bodies of the French, and both sustaining with imperturbable patience and gallantry the severity of a march through probably the very worst roads in Europe, and of frequent skirmishes with their pursuers. But the minor divisions of D"Anrep and Bexhouden retreated without keeping up the requisite communications with either Bennigsen or Galitzin, and consequently suffered considerably, though the matter was grossly exaggerated in the French bulletins.
Bennigsen, in spite of Kaminskoy"s orders to retreat at all hazards, made a stand, and a most gallant one at Pultusk. Having his left in that town, and his right on a wood, the general conceived his position to be too favourable for speedy abandonment, and on the 26th of December expected the onset of Lannes, Davoust, and the imperial guard of France.
They charged with their usual impetuosity, and drove the Russian right wing, under General Barclay de Tolly, out of the wood; but Bennigsen skilfully availed himself of this occurrence; by his orders Barclay de Tolly retired much further than was necessary for his own safety, and the French, advancing unguardedly, found themselves confronted on very unfavourable ground with the Russian main body, which had now been arranged on a new line of battle, and of a battery of 120 guns, placed so as to command their march with terrible efficacy. The result was that the Russians lost 5000 in killed and wounded, the French 8000--one of their wounded being Marshal Lannes himself; and the French drew back from the hardly contested field with such haste, that all next day the advancing Cossacks sought in vain for their rear-guard. On the same day, and with nearly as much success, Prince Galitzin halted also, and awaited and repelled his pursuers at Golymin; and had either Bennigsen or Galitzin been supported by the other divisions which were doing nothing within a few miles of their respective marches, these events might have been improved so as to involve the French army in great and immediate perplexity. But in truth, the total want of plan and combination on the part of Kaminskoy was by this time apparent to the veriest tyro in his camp. Symptoms of actual insanity appeared shortly afterwards, and the chief command was transferred, with universal approbation, to Bennigsen.
The affairs of Pultusk and Golymin, however, were productive of excellent effects. They raised to a high pitch the spirits of the Russian soldiery; and they afforded Napoleon such a specimen of the character of his new enemy, that instead of pursuing the campaign, as he had announced in his bulletins, he thought fit to retire, and place his troops in winter quarters. He himself took up his residence at Warsaw, and the army occupied cantonments in various towns to the eastward.
But General Bennigsen, having proved at Pultusk what Russian troops could do when under a determined commander, no sooner found himself at the head of an army of nearly 100,000 men, than he resolved to disturb the French in their quarters, and at all events give them such occupation as might enable the King of Prussia to revictual Konigsberg, where the few troops, gathered round that unfortunate sovereign, were already beginning to suffer many privations. With this view Bennigsen advanced as far as Mohrungen, where the French sustained considerable damage in a skirmish, and from whence his Cossacks spread themselves abroad over the country--creating such confusion, that the leaguer of Konigsberg being for the moment relaxed, the Prussian garrison received welcome supplies of all kinds, and Napoleon himself perceived the necessity of breaking up his cantonments, and once more concentrating the army for active war.
His design was to occupy Willensberg, to the rear of the great Russian camp at Mohrungen; thus cutting off the new enemy"s communications with his own means of resource, in the same manner which had proved so fatal to the Austrians at Ulm, and the Prussians at Jena. But Bennigsen, having learned the plan from an intercepted despatch, immediately countermarched his army with masterly skill, and thus involved Napoleon in a long series of manuvres, not to be executed in such a country at that dismal season without the extremity of hardship. The Russians themselves, inured as they were to northern climates, and incapable of even dreaming that a soldier could seek safety in flight, were reduced to the border of frenzy by the privations of these long marches. Their commissariat was wretched: the soldiers had often no food, except such frozen roots as they could dig out of the ground; and, tortured with toil and famine, they at length demanded battle so vehemently, that, against his own judgment, General Bennigsen consented to grant the prayer. He selected the town of Preuss-Eylau, and a strong position behind it, as his field of battle; and--after two skirmishes, one at Landsberg, the other nearer the chosen ground, in the former of which the French, in the latter the Russians, had the advantage,--the whole army reached Preuss-Eylau on the 7th of February.
In the confusion of so great a movement, a division designed by Bennigsen to occupy the town itself, misunderstood the order, and evacuated it at the approach of the enemy"s van. The French took possession of the place accordingly, and--General Bennigsen commanding it to be regained, as soon as he learned the mistake that had occurred--the whole day was spent in severe fighting within the town, which was taken and retaken several times, and at the fall of night remained in the hands of the French. On either side the loss had been very great, and Napoleon coming up in person, perceived that the contest must needs be renewed at daybreak. The night was clear, and he could trace the enemy"s line darkening the whole of an admirably selected position, between which and the dearly contested town, a level s.p.a.ce covered with snow, and two or three small frozen lakes, glittered in the mingled light of an unclouded moon and innumerable watch-fires.
The great battle of PREUSS-EYLAU was fought on the 8th of February. At dawn of day the French charged at two different points in strong columns, and were unable to shake the iron steadiness of the infantry, while the Russian horse, and especially the Cossacks under their gallant Hetman Platoff, made fearful execution on each division, as successively they drew back from their vain attempt. A fierce storm arose at mid-day: the snow drifted right in the eyes of the Russians; the village of Serpallen, on their left, caught fire, and the smoke also rolled dense upon them. Davoust skilfully availed himself of the opportunity, and turned their flank so rapidly, that Serpallen was lost, and the left wing compelled to wheel backwards so as to form almost at right angles with the rest of the line. The Prussian corps of L"Estocq, a small but determined fragment of the campaign of Jena, appeared at this critical moment in the rear of the Russian left; and, charging with such gallantry as had in former times been expected from the soldiery of the Great Frederick, drove back Davoust and restored the Russian line. The action continued for many hours along the whole line--the French attacked boldly, the Russians driving them back with unfailing resolution. Ney, and a fresh division, at length came up, and succeeded in occupying the village of Schloditten, on the road to Konigsberg. To regain this, and thereby recover the means of communicating with the King of Prussia, was deemed necessary; and it was carried accordingly at the point of the bayonet. This was at ten o"clock at night. So ended the longest and by far the severest battle in which Buonaparte had as yet been engaged. The French are supposed to have had 90,000 men under arms at its commencement; the Russians not more than 60,000. After fourteen hours of fighting, either army occupied the same position as in the morning. Twelve of Napoleon"s eagles were in the hands of Bennigsen, and the field between was covered with 50,000 corpses, of whom at least half were French.
Either leader claimed the victory; Bennigsen exhibiting as proof of his success the twelve eagles which his army, admitted to be inferior in numbers, bore off the field: Buonaparte, that he kept possession of the field, while the enemy retired, the very night after the battle, from Eylau towards Konigsberg. It was, in truth, a drawn battle; and to have found an equal was sufficient bitterness to Napoleon. The Russian general-in-chief had retreated, in opposition to the opinion of most of his council, out of anxiety for the personal safety of the King of Prussia at Konigsberg, and desire to recruit his army ere another great action should be hazarded. The French, triumphant as was the language of their bulletins, made no effort to pursue. Bennigsen conducted his army in perfect order to Konigsberg, and the Cossacks issuing from that city continued for more than a week to waste the country according to their pleasure, without any show of opposition from the French. But the best proof how severely Napoleon had felt the struggle of Preuss-Eylau, is to be found in a communication which he made to Frederick William, on the 13th of February, five days after the battle, offering him, in effect, the complete, or nearly complete restoration of his dominions, provided he would accept of a separate peace: with the king"s answer; namely, that it was impossible for him to enter on any treaty unless the Czar were a party in it. Finally, on the 19th of February, Napoleon left Eylau, and retreated with his whole army on the Vistula; satisfied that it would be fatal rashness to engage in another campaign in Poland, while several fortified towns, and, above all, Dantzick, held out in his rear; and determined to have possession of these places, and to summon new forces from France, ere he should again meet in the field such an enemy as the Russian had proved to be.
Dantzick was defended with the more desperate resolution, because it was expected that, as soon as the season permitted, an English fleet and army would certainly be sent to its relief. But the besiegers having a prodigious superiority of numbers, and conducting the siege with every advantage of skill, the place was at length compelled to surrender, on the 7th of May; after which event, Napoleon"s extraordinary exertions in hurrying supplies from France, Switzerland and the Rhine country, and the addition of the division of 25,000, which had captured Dantzick, enabled him to take the field again at the head of not less than 280,000 men. The Russian general also had done what was in his power to recruit his army during this interval; but his utmost zeal could effect no more than bringing his muster up again to its original point--90,000; the chief blame lying, as it was alleged, with the coldness of the English cabinet, who, instead of lavishing gold on the Emperor of Russia, as had been done in other similar cases, were with difficulty persuaded to grant him at this critical time, so small a supply as 80,000. Russia has men to any amount at her command; but the poverty of the national purse renders it at all times very difficult for her to maintain a large army in a distant contest.
Bennigsen, nevertheless, was the first to reappear in the field. In the beginning of June he attacked Ney"s division stationed at Gustadt, and pursued them to Deppen, where, on the 8th, a smart action took place, and Napoleon arrived in person to support his troops. The Russians were then forced to retire towards Heilsberg, where they halted, and maintained their position, during a whole day, in the face of an enemy prodigiously superior in numbers. The carnage on both sides was fearful; and Bennigsen, continuing his retreat, placed the river Aller between him and Napoleon.
The French Emperor now exerted all his art to draw the Russian into a general action: the resistance he had met with had surprised and enraged him, and he was eager to overpower and extinguish Bennigsen before further supplies of these hardy Muscovities should come up to swell his ranks. The Russian general was on the eastern bank of the Aller, opposite to the town of Friedland, when Buonaparte once more came up with him on the 13th of June. There was a long and narrow wooden bridge over the river, close by, which might have been destroyed if not defended; and Napoleon"s object was to induce Bennigsen, instead of abiding by his position, to abandon its advantages, pa.s.s over to the western bank, and accept battle with the town and river in his rear. His crafty management outwitted the Russian, who, being persuaded that the troops which appeared in front of him were only a small division of the French army, was tempted to send some regiments over the river for the purpose of chastising them. The French, sometimes retreating, and then again returning to the combat, the Russians were by degrees induced to cross in greater numbers; until at length Bennigsen found himself and his whole army on the western bank, with the town and bridge in their rear--thus completely entrapped in the snare laid for him by his enemy.
On the 14th of June, under circ.u.mstances thus disadvantageous, the Russian general was compelled to accept battle. His army occupied open ground; the intricate and narrow streets of the town of Friedland, and the bridge behind it, appeared to be his only means of retreat in case of misadventure; and in front, and on either flank, extended those woods which had covered Buonaparte"s stratagems of the preceding day, and which now afforded complete shelter to the Imperial army--the means of attacking from whatever point they might select--and of retiring with safety as often as it might be found advisable.
The battle commenced at ten in the morning, and the Russians stood their ground with unbroken resolution until between four and five in the evening; sustaining numberless charges of foot and horse, and exposed all the while to a murderous cannonade. At length Napoleon put himself at the head of the French line, and commanded a general a.s.sault of all arms, which was executed with overpowering effect. Having lost full 12,000 men, General Bennigsen was at last compelled to attempt a retreat; the French poured after him into the town: the first Russian division which forced the pa.s.sage of the river destroyed the bridge behind them in their terror; and the rest of the army escaped by means of deep and dangerous fords, which, desperate as the resource they afforded was, had been discovered only in the moment of necessity.
Nevertheless such were the coolness and determination of the Russians, that they saved all their baggage, and lost only seventeen cannon; and such was the impression which their obstinate valour left on the enemy, that their retreat towards the Niemen was performed without any show of molestation.
The results of the battle of Friedland were, however, as great as could have been expected from any victory. On the retreat of Bennigsen towards the Niemen, the unfortunate King of Prussia, evacuating Konigsberg, where he now perceived it must be impossible to maintain himself, sought a last and precarious shelter in the seaport of Memel; and the Emperor Alexander, overawed by the genius of Napoleon, which had triumphed over troops more resolute than had ever before opposed him, and alarmed for the consequence of some decisive measure towards the re-organisation of the Poles as a nation, began to think seriously of peace. Buonaparte, on his part also, had many reasons for being anxious to bring hostilities to a close. The Swedish king was in Pomerania, besieging Stralsund, and hourly expecting reinforcements from England, which might have ended in a formidable diversion in the rear of the French army. Schill, an able partizan, was in arms in Prussia, where the general discontent was such, that nothing by opportunity seemed wanting for a national insurrection against the conquerors. The further advance of the French towards the north could hardly have failed to afford such an opportunity. Neither could this be executed, to all appearance, without involving the necessity of proclaiming the independence of Poland; thereby giving a character of mortal rancour to the war with Russia, and, in all likelihood, calling Austria once more into the field. Under such circ.u.mstances the minds of Napoleon and Alexander were equally disposed towards negotiation: General Bennigsen sent, on the 21st of June, to demand an armistice; and to this proposal the victor of Friedland yielded immediate a.s.sent.
In truth over and above the parsimony of the court of St. James in regard to subsidies, the recent conduct of the war on the part of England had been so ill-judged, and on the whole so unfortunate, that the Czar might be excused for desiring to escape from that alliance.
Almost the only occasion on which the character of the British arms had been gloriously maintained, was the battle of Maida, in Calabria, fought July the 4th, 1806--when Sir John Stuart and 7000 English soldiers encountered a superior French force under General Regnier, and drove them from the field with great loss. This was one of those rare occasions on which French and English troops have actually crossed bayonets--the steadiness of the latter inspired the former with panic, and they fled in confusion. But this occurrence, except for its moral influence on the English soldiery, was of small importance. General Stuart had been sent to support the Calabrian peasantry in an insurrection against Joseph Buonaparte; the insurgents were on the whole unable to stand their ground against the regular army of the intrusive king; and the English, soon after their fruitless victory, altogether withdrew. The British had, indeed, taken possession of Curacao, and of the Cape of Good Hope (this last an acquisition of the highest moment to the Indian empire); but on the whole the ill success of our measures had been answerable to the narrow and shallow system of policy in which they originated--the system of frittering away blood and gold upon detached objects, instead of rallying the whole resources of the empire around some one great leader for some one great purpose. The British expeditions of this period to the Turkish dominions and to Spanish America were especially distinguished for narrowness of design, imbecility of execution, and consequent misadventure.
On the a.s.sumption of the Imperial dignity by Napoleon, the Ottoman Porte, dazzled by the apparently irresistible splendour of his fate, sent an emba.s.sy to congratulate him; and in effect the ancient alliance between France and Turkey was re-established. Napoleon consequently had little difficulty in procuring from Constantinople a declaration of war against Russia, the great hereditary enemy of the Turk, at the time when he was about to encounter the armies of the Czar in Poland. The Dardanelles were shut against Russian vessels; and the English government, considering this as sufficient evidence that the Grand Seignior was attaching himself to the Antibritannic Confederacy, despatched a squadron of ships under Admiral Duckworth, in February, 1807, with orders to force the pa.s.sage of the Dardanelles, present themselves before Constantinople, and demand from the Porte the custody _pro tempore_ of all her ships of war. The Turks negotiated for a week upon this proposal, but in the meantime increased and manned their fortifications, under the direction of French engineers, with such skill, that the English admiral began to be seriously alarmed for his own safety; and at length, on the 1st of March, effected his retreat through the Straits with considerable loss--this disgrace being the only result of his expedition. On the 20th of the same month (of March, 1807) another English expedition under General Fraser, having sailed from Sicily to Egypt, took possession of Alexandria. But every subsequent step they took proved unfortunate: after severe loss the English were compelled to enter into a convention with the Turks, and wholly evacuate Egypt on the 20th of September.
In January, 1807, an English expedition landed near Montevideo, and carried that city by a.s.sault. Sir Home Popham, the admiral, was recalled, and tried by a court-martial, on the ground that he had undertaken this warfare without due authority; but he escaped with a reprimand, and new reinforcements were sent out, first under General Crawford, and secondly under General Whitelocke. The last-named officer invested Buenos Ayres, and commanded a general a.s.sault of that town on the 5th of July; on which occasion, notwithstanding the excellent behaviour of the soldiery, he was repulsed with a loss of 2000 killed, wounded, and prisoners; and reduced to such extremity, that he was soon afterwards glad to enter into a convention, and wholly withdraw the armament. The timid and incompetent Whitelocke was tried and cashiered.
Some of these disasters were unknown at the time when Bennigsen demanded an armistice; but the general ill success of the British expeditions was notorious, and produced without doubt a very serious impression on the mind of Alexander.
The armistice was ratified on the 23rd of June, and on the 25th the Emperors of France and Russia met personally, each accompanied by a few attendants, on a raft moored on the river Niemen, near the town of Tilsit. The sovereigns embraced each other, and retiring under a canopy had a long conversation, to which no one was a witness. At its termination the appearances of mutual goodwill and confidence were marked: immediately afterwards the town of Tilsit was neutralised, and the two Emperors established their courts there, and lived together, in the midst of the lately hostile armies, more like old friends who had met on a party of pleasure, than enemies and rivals attempting by diplomatic means the arrangement of differences which had for years been deluging Europe with blood. Whatever flatteries could be suggested by the consummate genius and mature experience of Napoleon, were lavished, and produced their natural effects, on the mind of a young autocrat, of great ambition, and as great vanity. The intercourse of the Emperors a.s.sumed by degrees the appearance of a brotherlike intimacy. They spent their mornings in reviewing each other"s troops, or in unattended rides; their evenings seemed to be devoted to the pleasures of the table, the spectacle, music, dancing and gallantry. Meanwhile the terms of a future alliance were in effect discussed, and settled much more rapidly than could have been expected from any of the usual apparatus of diplomatic negotiation.
The unfortunate King of Prussia was invited to appear at Tilsit; but, complying with this invitation, was admitted to no share of the intimacy of Napoleon. The conqueror studiously, and on every occasion, marked the difference between his sentiments respecting this prince and the young and powerful sovereign, for whose sake alone any shadow of royalty was to be conceded to the fallen house of Brandenburg. The beautiful and fascinating queen also arrived at Tilsit; but she was treated even more coldly and harshly than her husband. Involuntary tears rushed from her eyes as she submitted to the contemptuous civilities of Napoleon. His behaviour to this admirable person rekindled with new fervour the wrath and hatred of every Prussian bosom; and her death, following soon afterwards, and universally attributed to the cruel laceration which all her feelings as a woman and a queen had undergone, was treasured as a last injury, demanding, at whatever hazard, a terrible expiation.
The Treaty of Tilsit, to which, as the doc.u.ment itself bore testimony, the King of Prussia was admitted as a party solely by reason of Napoleon"s "esteem for the Emperor of Russia," was ratified on the 7th July. Napoleon restored, by this act, to Frederick William, Ancient Prussia, and the French conquests in Upper Saxony--the King agreeing to adopt "the continental system," in other words, to be henceforth the va.s.sal of the conqueror. The Polish provinces of Prussia were erected into a separate princ.i.p.ality, styled "the Grand Duchy of Warsaw," and bestowed on the Elector of Saxony; with the exception, however, of some territories a.s.signed to Russia, and of Dantzick, which was declared a free city, to be garrisoned by French troops until the ratification of a maritime peace. The Prussian dominions in Lower Saxony and on the Rhine, with Hanover, Hesse-Ca.s.sel, and various other small states, formed a new kingdom of Westphalia, of which Jerome Buonaparte, Napoleon"s youngest brother, was recognised as King; Jerome having at length made his peace with his brother by repudiating his wife, an American lady of the name of Patterson, and consenting to a new alliance, more consonant with the views of the Emperor, with a daughter of the King of Wirtemberg. The Elector of Saxony was recognised as another _King_ of Napoleon"s creation; Joseph Buonaparte as King of Naples; and Louis, of Holland.
Finally, Russia accepted the mediation of France for a peace with Turkey, and France that of Russia for a peace with England.
Such were the public articles of the peace of Tilsit; but it contained secret articles besides; and of these the English government were, ere long, fortunate enough to ascertain the import.
The British cabinet had undergone a complete change in March, 1807--the management of affairs pa.s.sing from the friends and heirs of Mr. Fox into the hands of Mr. Perceval and other statesmen of the school of Pitt. The unhappy conduct of the war had rendered the preceding government eminently unpopular; and the measures of the new one a.s.sumed from the beginning a character of greater energy. But the orders which had been given must be fulfilled; and the councils of 1806 bequeathed a fatal legacy in the disastrous expeditions of 1807. Lord Granville Leveson Gower[57] (the minister at St. Petersburg) was ere this time prepared to offer to the Czar such subsidies as he had in vain expected when preparing for the campaign of Poland; but it was too late to retrieve the error of the preceding cabinet; and the English amba.s.sador, being unable to break off the negotiations at Tilsit, was compelled to bestow all his efforts on penetrating the secrets of the compact wherein they ended.
The result of his exertions was the complete a.s.surance of the government of St. James"s, that the Emperor of Russia had adopted the alliance of Napoleon to an extent far beyond what appeared on the face of the treaty of the 7th July; that he had agreed not only to lay English commerce, in case his mediation for a peace should fail, under the same ban with that of the decrees of Berlin, but to place himself at the head of a general confederation of the Northern Maritime Powers against the naval supremacy of England--in other words, resign his own fleets, with those of Denmark, to the service of Napoleon. In requital of this obligation the French Emperor unquestionably agreed to permit the Czar to conquer Finland from Sweden--thereby adding immeasurably to the security of St.
Petersburg. On the other hand it is almost as impossible to doubt that Alexander pledged himself not to interfere with those ambitious designs as to the Spanish Peninsula, which Napoleon was ere long to develop, and which were destined ultimately to work his ruin.
In a word, there seems to be little doubt that Napoleon broached at Tilsit the dazzling scheme of dividing the European world virtually between the two great monarchs of France and Russia: and that the Czar, provided he were willing to look on, while his Imperial brother of the West subjected Spain, Portugal and England to his yoke, was induced to count on equal forbearance, whatever schemes he might venture on for his own aggrandis.e.m.e.nt, at the expense of the smaller states of the North of Europe, and, above all, of the Ottoman Porte.
[Footnote 56: Kosciusko himself subsequently disavowed any knowledge of the production.]
[Footnote 57: Afterwards first Earl Granville.]
CHAPTER XXII
British Expedition to Copenhagen--Coalition of France, Austria, Prussia, and Russia, against English Commerce--Internal affairs of France--The Administration of Napoleon--his Council of State--Court--Code--Public Works--Manufactures--Taxes--Military Organisation--The Conscription.
Napoleon, having left strong garrisons in the maritime cities of Poland and Northern Germany, returned to Paris in August, and was received by the Senate and other public bodies with all the triumph and excess of adulation. The Swedish King abandoned Pomerania immediately on hearing of the treaty of Tilsit. In effect the authority of the Emperor appeared now to be consolidated over the whole continent of Europe. He had reached indeed the pinnacle of his power and pride;--henceforth he was to descend; urged downwards, step by step, by the reckless audacity of ambition and the gathering weight of guilt.
The English government, being satisfied that the naval force of Denmark was about to be employed for the purposes of Napoleon, determined to antic.i.p.ate him, while it was yet time, and to send into the Baltic such a fleet as should at once convince the court of Copenhagen that resistance must be vain, and so bring about the surrender of the vessels of war (to be retained by England, not in property, but in pledge until the conclusion of a general peace), without any loss of life or compromise of honour. Twenty-seven sail of the line, carrying a considerable body of troops under the orders of Earl Cathcart, appeared before the capital of Denmark in the middle of August, and found the government wholly unprepared for defence. The high spirit of the Crown Prince, however, revolted against yielding to a demand which imperious necessity alone could have rendered justifiable on the part of England: nor, unfortunately, were these scruples overcome until the Danish troops had suffered severely in an action against the British, and the capital itself had been bombarded during three days, in which many public buildings, churches and libraries perished, and the private population sustained heavy loss both of life and property. The fleet being at length surrendered, the English withdrew with it in safety; and the rage of Napoleon--ill disguised in lofty philippics about the violations of the rights and privileges of independent nations--betrayed how completely he had calculated on the use of this marine, and how little he had antic.i.p.ated a movement of such vigour from the cabinet of St.
James"s.
The Emperor of Russia is said to have signified, through a confidential channel, that, though for the present he found himself compelled to temporise, he approved and admired the procedure of the English government. If this be true, however, his public and open conduct bore a very different appearance. The British amba.s.sador was dismissed from St.
Petersburg, and a general coalition of Russia, Austria, Prussia, and Denmark, against the commerce of England being speedily afterwards formed, the decrees of Berlin--still further strengthened by other decrees, issued by Napoleon on the 7th December, 1806, at Milan--were in fact announced as part and parcel of the universal law of the continent.
Alexander of Russia marched a large army into Finland, and took possession of that great Swedish province--the promised booty of Tilsit.
His fleet in the Mediterranean gained a signal victory over the Turks, and terms of amity between the courts of St. Petersburg and Constantinople were at length arranged under the mediation or dictation of Napoleon. Everything seemed to point to a state of universal tranquillity or submission throughout the continent, and to a steady devotion of all the resources of the European monarchies to the service of the French Emperor and the destruction of his last and greatest enemy.
That enemy was ere long, in consequence of a new and unforeseen explosion of guilty ambition, to possess the means of rekindling the continental war, of distracting the alliances of Napoleon, and ultimately of ruining the power which, for the present, appeared irresistible. But a short interval of tranquillity ensued: and we may avail ourselves of the opportunity to recur for a moment to the internal administration of French affairs under the Imperial Government, as now finally organised.
Buonaparte, shortly after the peace of Tilsit, abolished _the Tribunate_; and there remained, as the last shadows of a.s.semblies having any political influence, the Legislative Senate and the Council of State. The former of these bodies was early reduced to a mere instrument for recording the imperial decrees; the latter consisted of such persons as Napoleon chose to invest for the time with the privilege of being summoned to the palace, when it pleased him to hear the opinions of others as to measures originating in his own mind, or suggested to him by his ministers. He appears to have, on many occasions, permitted these counsellors to speak their sentiments frankly and fully, although differing from himself; but there were looks and gestures which sufficiently indicated the limits of this toleration, and which persons, owing their lucrative appointment to his mere pleasure, and liable to lose it at his nod, were not likely to transgress. They spoke openly and honestly only on topics in which their master"s feelings were not much concerned.
His favourite saying during the continuance of his power was, "I am the State;" and in the exile of St. Helena he constantly talked of himself as having been, from necessity, the Dictator of France. In effect no despotism within many degrees so complete and rigid was every before established in a civilised and Christian country. The whole territory was divided into prefectures--each prefect being appointed by Napoleon--carefully selected for a province with which he had no domestic relations--largely paid--and entrusted with such a complete delegation of power that, in Napoleon"s own language, each was in his department an _Empereur a pet.i.t pied_. Each of these officers had under his entire control inferior local magistrates, holding power from him as he did from the Emperor: each had his instructions direct from Paris; each was bound by every motive of interest to serve, to the utmost of his ability, the government from which all things were derived, to be hoped for, and to be dreaded. Wherever the Emperor was, in the midst of his hottest campaigns, he examined the details of administration at home more closely than, perhaps, any other sovereign of half so great an empire did during the profoundest peace. It was said of him that his dearest amus.e.m.e.nt, when he had nothing else to do, was to solve problems in algebra or geometry. He carried this pa.s.sion into every department of affairs; and having, with his own eye, detected some errors of importance in the public accounts, shortly after his administration began, there prevailed thenceforth in all the financial records of the state such clearness and accuracy as are not often exemplified in those of a large private fortune. Nothing was below his attention, and he found time for everything. The humblest functionary discharged his duty under a lively sense of the Emperor"s personal superintendence; and the omnipresence of his police came in lieu, wherever politics were not touched upon, of the guarding powers of a free press, a free senate, and public opinion. Except in political cases the trial by jury was the right of every citizen. The _Code Napoleon_, that elaborate system of jurisprudence, in the formation of which the Emperor laboured personally along with the most eminent lawyers and enlightened men of the time, was a boon of inestimable value to France. "I shall go down to posterity"
(said he, with just pride) "with the Code in my hand." It was the first uniform system of laws which the French Monarchy had ever possessed: and being drawn up with consummate skill and wisdom, it at this day forms the code not only of France, but of a great portion of Europe besides.
Justice, as between man and man, was administered on sound and fixed principles, and by unimpeached tribunals. The arbitrary Commission Courts of Napoleon interfered with nothing but offences, real or alleged, against his authority.